Authenticity: on Inciting a Revolution in Your Soul

Authenticity: on Inciting a Revolution in Your Soul

What is Your Authentic Self?

Living from your intuitive core, your belly, your heart, and letting your soul lead and spirit guide you, your words and actions will be naturally subversive. You will go to your edge, soften, and become wildly tender. The question is, will you wholly inhabit your own revolution? In beauty? This inner revolution is a perpetual ceremony of the heart. It’s what you are for.

- Advertisement -

The Power of Authenticity

When you are real, cooked down to the essence, rather than half-baked to get approval, to look good, the projections from others may fly, seek you out, and try to stick to you. Don’t let them. Instead, let your authenticity support you in carrying on whole-hearted, vulnerable conversations to resolve whatever arises. It is hard work. Uncomfortable. Deeply human. Can be harrowing. And often downright amazing. Intimate. Naked. Courageous work is marked by our solid presence. Here. Now.

The Importance of Soul-Centered Living

Being too comfortable, amenable, pliable to the point of contorting yourself — is a ticket to selling your soul right up the river. Don’t buy it. When you live from your own knowingness, from your gut and your wildly-rooted intelligence, you feel alive. Genuinely, creatively alive.

The Journey to Authenticity

When you get real, it is actually not about you. Your individual program is only the ground from which you step. From which you step and choose whether you will make this life of yours a walk of grit and beauty, or one of accommodation to the forces that insist you do it their way, be well-behaved, produce, consume, make nice, and as the poet, Mary Oliver says, "barely breathing and calling it a life."

The Need for Inner Excavation

To inhabit your own core, your vital, knowing center, and a soul-centered way of being, you need to do the inner excavation. What we call, in Jungian psychology-speak, Shadow work and in shamanic-speak, Underworld soul work, including ego-dismemberment work to heal old wounds and retrieve parts of your soul you had otherwise disowned or split off. We need these pieces of our souls, as well as aspects of our bodies, and our connection with Spirit, and with the earth, along with the Other-than-human-ones and wild intelligent forms of life — to feel deliciously alive, ready to roll, to care for our own souls and look out for others.

The Importance of Honesty

When you are transparent, you will stand out as you are truly seen. When you are transparent, others can "see through" you into you as your heart and true essence shine. You are clear, direct, and kind. You are not an enigma; you don’t leave people scratching their heads wondering what you just said and did.

What Does it Mean to be Congruent?

When you are congruent, you are wholistically aligned. What you think, say, feel in your heart, feel in your body, and your actions will line up to support and reflect each other. You know it in your body, often in your gut, when you put your attention there.

Conclusion

Authenticity is the grunt work of the soul, of any deeply human, spiritual path. It’s a slow dive, a conscious descent into the depths of your soul, the dark ground of your being and your dreams: the Underworld of your psyche. This is vital work — no way around it — to discover what you’ve tucked away in the archetypal Shadow of your own psyche. If you’re lucky, you will unearth what you had otherwise disowned to adapt to the egoic, mechanistic, competitive, earth-ravaging ways of modern Western culture. And most often, these pieces of your otherwise whole psyche that you had disowned are what makes you utterly You. Beautifully. Creatively. Wildly alive. Authentically so.

FAQs

Q: What is authenticity?
A: Authenticity is the state of being real, genuine, and true to oneself, without pretenses or artificiality.

Q: Why is authenticity important?
A: Authenticity is important because it allows us to live a life that is true to who we are, without trying to fit into someone else’s mold or expectations.

Q: How can I cultivate authenticity in my life?
A: You can cultivate authenticity by being honest with yourself and others, being willing to take risks and be vulnerable, and embracing your true nature and values.

Q: What are some common obstacles to authenticity?
A: Common obstacles to authenticity include fear of rejection, fear of being different, and the need for approval or validation from others.

Q: How can I overcome these obstacles?
A: You can overcome these obstacles by practicing self-acceptance, self-compassion, and self-awareness, and by being willing to take risks and be vulnerable.